Country: England
Less about what they think and more about how it’s a problem that wider footballing circles are starting to notice.Oh no.
Less about what they think and more about how it’s a problem that wider footballing circles are starting to notice.Oh no.
That’s because City’s assign the right enough of players, to activate the press at the right time, occupy the right space, and make the right movement. Their pressing is well planned, it’s planned according to how we occupy our space, and also the weaknesses of our certain players. This makes us hard to get out of their press. And our ball can only circulate in the deep area.What's the worst thing about the football we've been playing currently?
For me it's how slow and laboured our build up is. Very little happens through the lines. We have to spend 5 minutes knocking it from Luiz to Xhaka to Leno to Gabriel ad nauseum before we can progress anything. It was so frustrating to watch us spend the last half hour versus City unable to get past our own half way line.
If we have the right players (quicker defenders), our defensive line could push higher with our front line when we press. So our midfield will not have gaps (as our front line and defensive line are close together).
But in our plan, we have a deeper defensive line, to prevent their strikers runing past our defenders (although it will leave gaps in the midfield). Our CMs were pushed up so that we can create an effective press. If the plan went well, city should be struggled to build from the back, they will be forced to go long. Despite us pressing well as a unit, Guardiola finds a way to create the spare man, and break our press. If this happened, they could exploit the gap we have left in the midfield. You can see the goal we conceded is similar to the one we conceded to Chelsea in the FA cup final.
I watched bits the match casually (not using an analysing mind to watch it). So I am not sure how Guardiola beat our press, or how we failed to beat theirs.
For us, one solution is of course have a quicker defender, so that we can push our defensive up to close the midfield gaps. But more importantly, I would like to go back and watch the match again, to see if Arteta was reactive to Guardiola’s way of getting out from our press. Did Arteta make tweaks to shxt down guardiola’s solution? Or did he create another problem for Guardiola to solve?
That’s because City’s assign the right enough of players, to activate the press at the right time, occupy the right space, and make the right movement. Their pressing is well planned, it’s planned according to how we occupy our space, and also the weaknesses of our certain players. This makes us hard to get out of their press. And our ball can only circulate in the deep area.
This is a problem Pep has created for Arteta. And Arteta has to come up with a solution. (Maybe tuck in a winger to create more passing options in the middle is a solution. Or drop a CM to the CB position to create the spare man.)
Or alternatively, Arteta can create a new problem for pep to solve, exploiting the downside of their high press.
It’s all about how one team press, vs how another team react to it.
Don’t buy this better defensively crap. We’re just parking the bus :rofl:.
The general lack of creativity and precision up top is becoming very apparent. I get that Arteta wants to fix the defense first, and that floats totally. It's time to get the further step forward.
May I suggest...
Partey - Xhaka
Özil?
We don't mention No. 10 around these quarters. BLASPHEMY!!
At any point we have the GK + 3 CB + 2 DMs who cant join the attack.. That leaves only 5 players doing the attacking and 6 players always in defensive mode. Both DMs cant / dont make runs into the box ... so its never going to be pretty football.What's the worst thing about the football we've been playing currently?
For me it's how slow and laboured our build up is. Very little happens through the lines. We have to spend 5 minutes knocking it from Luiz to Xhaka to Leno to Gabriel ad nauseum before we can progress anything. It was so frustrating to watch us spend the last half hour versus City unable to get past our own half way line.
I'm willing to bet that our average number of goals conceded is far less under Arteta than Emery and average number of points per league game is better. Any one got the stats?To be honest our underlying numbers aren’t better under Arteta than Emery. Our problem is our players, not our manager. Only a handful or fewer managers make a real difference in a team’s performance. We don’t have any attackers who are good at progressing the ball up the pitch, and don’t have any midfielders who create. That’s our biggest problem. We don’t create enough chances.
Wondering about playing 442 more and more these days. I feel like we have the players to do it.
Out of possession:
---------Auba-------Pepe
Saka-Xhaka-Partey-AMN
Tierney-Gabriel-Luiz-Bellerin
---------------Leno
In possession:
-Tierney-------Auba----Pepe-------Bellerin
----------------Saka----------------
-------Xhaka------Partey---------AMN
---------------Gabriel---Luiz
----------------------Leno
5 up 5 down
Pepe close to Auba
Pepe closer to goal
Saka with freedom
Partey allowed to break forward
Counter attacks covered by AMN
Xhaka in his comfortable deep ldm role.
Xhaka can't receive the ball on the half-turn, Ceballos had a few opportunities to get us up the pitch but was sloppy with his passing, Saka was best equipped for that but he had the touchline as an extra defender which made it easier for City to box him in.I'm a bit more pessimistic than you. I don't think it's a Pep masterclass as much as we struggle to beat most presses. It feels like any kind of high press in our third nullifies our build up.
Our football is dire. Brighton, Leeds and Villa offer more going forwards then we do.
Yes, we are defensively more solid, but we have to sacrifice an attacking player to play 5 at the back. Is the trade off worth it? After being beaten by Liverpool and City and scraping every victory bar the Fulham one - I'd say no.
We don't though, because going forward Saka (the LWB) plays infield and high on the left.
People saying we play 5 at the back so can't be good going forward, have you not seen some of the goals we've scored this season and in general under Arteta? Our pass and move goals are elite. The problem is everything has to be perfect to score a goal at the moment. So we either need more balance in the attack and midfield or a world class gem of a player to produce something from nothing.
Going forward Saka, Willian, Pepe, Partey, Auba, Ceballos, Tierney, Gabriel and Leno need to start as the base core of the team. After that you use either Luiz or Holding and AMN or Bellerin.
People will be reactionary because of Liverpool/City away matches. But the facts are we probably should've come away with points in at least one of those games and we had chances to do so.